Google is dropping support for Extensible Messaging and PresenceProtocol (XMPP) in Google Voice on May 15, 2014.

If you are using Google Voice with an ATA (analog telephone adapter),such as one of the Obihai or Grandstream VOIP devices (or a hackedMagicJack Plus), this combination will no longer work after May 15,2014. Google Voice is very popular with these devices since togetherthey enable local phone service completely free of any monthly charges(but no E911).

The reason for this change is probably because users of these devicesare not seeing any advertising when using Google Voice.

There are no no-cost alternatives, though Localphone and Callcentric arepretty low cost alternatives, especially if you're not making thousandsof minutes of local calls per month. Ooma is a good alternative as well,but it costs a bit more and you must use their VOIP adapter.

Post by SMSGoogle is dropping support for Extensible Messaging and PresenceProtocol (XMPP) in Google Voice on May 15, 2014.If you are using Google Voice with an ATA (analog telephone adapter),such as one of the Obihai or Grandstream VOIP devices (or a hackedMagicJack Plus), this combination will no longer work after May 15,2014. Google Voice is very popular with these devices since togetherthey enable local phone service completely free of any monthly charges(but no E911).The reason for this change is probably because users of these devicesare not seeing any advertising when using Google Voice.

I have never seen nor heard and ad related to GV. No ads on Chrome. Noads related to my linked iPhone.

I've always assumed GV will eventually die since they've done nothingwith it in years - another idled Google project, but until then it hasbeen a great tool.

Post by SMSGoogle is dropping support for Extensible Messaging and PresenceProtocol (XMPP) in Google Voice on May 15, 2014.If you are using Google Voice with an ATA (analog telephone adapter),such as one of the Obihai or Grandstream VOIP devices (or a hackedMagicJack Plus), this combination will no longer work after May 15,2014. Google Voice is very popular with these devices since togetherthey enable local phone service completely free of any monthly charges(but no E911).The reason for this change is probably because users of these devicesare not seeing any advertising when using Google Voice.

I have never seen nor heard and ad related to GV. No ads on Chrome. Noads related to my linked iPhone.

You may be right. Between Adblock and my hosts file I get very few adsand I just assumed that Google Voice would be pushing out ads just likeGmail does when used with the web interface.

Post by Travis JamesI've always assumed GV will eventually die since they've done nothingwith it in years - another idled Google project, but until then it hasbeen a great tool.

There was nothing that needed to be done with it--it worked fine the wayit was.

What sucks is that Google Voice drove a bunch of VOIP providers out ofbusiness because there was no longer any reason for consumers to pay forVOIP services (other than the lack of E911 service; Sunrocket andStanaphone are two defunct companies, and other companies struggledbecause free is better than not free (Ooma, Vonage, Magicjack,Callcentric). But being free was necessary for Google Voice so it didnot have to be classified as a VOIP provider. You could use Google Voicewith third-party apps and devices but Google Voice was not classified asa VOIP service that was subjected to government regulation such as therequirement to provide E911 service.

Post by smsWhat sucks is that Google Voice drove a bunch of VOIP providers out of

...

Post by smsbecause free is better than not free (Ooma, Vonage, Magicjack,

I never understood the business model of "free". Advertising only goes sofar, and I never click on any of the Google ads.

I had a Skype number for a soccer club voicemail, and continued to pay $60a year for it even after GV came out, which would have been a lot betterfit, with it's ring through, and dial back, and ___FREE___

I tried to make GV work the way I wanted it to, as some people did, as a"business" line, separated and camouflaged from my personal home/cellular.That worked, but I didn't have all that much need for it.

I have a Vonage BasicTalk home phone, at $9.99, not the $19, or $24, or $34that various Vonage plans cost.

That's a reasonable amount for me, and I don't have to cobble my ownsolution with another VoIP provider, which I always felt was necessary withthe others.

I used to have a telephone though my cableco, which is a dedicated port ontheir Cisco 3925 modem, and a separate cable channel, so not really VoIP.That started out at $9.99/mo, but jumped to $29.99 after one year, and$49.99 after two years. Really? I think I'll switch to Vonage.And then they offer me $9.99 for a year, again, every time I talk to themabout anything, and on the occasional robo-call.

Some of Google offering are half baked, and the rules can change at anytime, and you are altogether on your own for support.

Post by d***@08.usenet.us.comI never understood the business model of "free". Advertising only goes sofar, and I never click on any of the Google ads.

Many ads are sold on impressions and not on clicks. When a movie comes out,you're likely to see graphics in a banner ad and maybe a trailer for themovie on many web portals such as Yahoo. No need to click through.

This is the "you get what you pay for" model. People complain when theirfree services have problems, but refuse to pay even a small amount tosubscribe to something. Well, the services I consider mission-critical Imake sure I pay for. That way I'll get customer service when I need it, andthe service will likely be more stable than the free ones.

Post by d***@08.usenet.us.comI never understood the business model of "free". Advertising only goes sofar, and I never click on any of the Google ads.

Many ads are sold on impressions and not on clicks. When a movie comes out,you're likely to see graphics in a banner ad and maybe a trailer for themovie on many web portals such as Yahoo. No need to click through.

This is the "you get what you pay for" model. People complain when theirfree services have problems, but refuse to pay even a small amount tosubscribe to something.

In the case of Google Voice, people would be happy to pay a small amountfor the service to continue as it had. They'd also be happy to pay forthe ability to do international forwarding. Google doesn't want to be inthis business anymore.

What is annoying is that Google Voice essentially drove several otherservices out of business by providing an equivalent service for free.

That said, there are still fee for service VOIP providers that offerfair prices and good quality with a non-proprietary system. Vonage isnot one of those providers. Callcentric is fairly priced. Well for aproprietary system, at $9.99, Vonage isn't bad (though Ooma is less) but$9.99 is not a price that you can sign up for. It's always amusing whensomeone proclaims that a particular service is a great deal when theyare getting a price obtainable only by being grandfathered in, or bycontinuously threatening to unsubscribe.

Post by d***@08.usenet.us.comI never understood the business model of "free". Advertising only goes sofar, and I never click on any of the Google ads.

Many ads are sold on impressions and not on clicks. When a movie comes out,you're likely to see graphics in a banner ad and maybe a trailer for themovie on many web portals such as Yahoo. No need to click through.

This is the "you get what you pay for" model. People complain when theirfree services have problems, but refuse to pay even a small amount tosubscribe to something.

In the case of Google Voice, people would be happy to pay a small amountfor the service to continue as it had. They'd also be happy to pay forthe ability to do international forwarding. Google doesn't want to be inthis business anymore.What is annoying is that Google Voice essentially drove several otherservices out of business by providing an equivalent service for free.That said, there are still fee for service VOIP providers that offerfair prices and good quality with a non-proprietary system. Vonage isnot one of those providers. Callcentric is fairly priced. Well for aproprietary system, at $9.99, Vonage isn't bad (though Ooma is less) but$9.99 is not a price that you can sign up for. It's always amusing whensomeone proclaims that a particular service is a great deal when theyare getting a price obtainable only by being grandfathered in, or bycontinuously threatening to unsubscribe.

OOMA is less than $4/month and seems to work just fine. A friend hashad it for years and I finally added it here and switched my landlinenumber to it.

One nice thing about OOMA is that there no configuration necessary forthe box in most cases.

Post by Roy[...]One nice thing about OOMA is that there no configuration necessary forthe box in most cases.

Hi Roy,

The only documentation I'm seeing is a quick start guide that sort-ofindicates it's a plug'n'play solution with some alternative hookups.

Since you have a functioning Ooma Telo, I hope you don't mind answeringa few Qs.

1. Lacking spec sheet, my guess is its Ethernet ports are only 10/100.Is that correct?

2. If one places an Ooma Telo on one's LAN, I'm assuming DHCP will beused by the Telo to acquire a LAN IP and the gateway IP. Is this acorrect assumption or is there, say, a webpage config setup withinthe Ooma Telo to setup its IP, gateway, DNS, and more?

3. If one places an Ooma Telo on one's LAN, that implies port(s) willneed to be opened on one's firewall/router and then it will appearto be a server running at one's home violating many/most/all ISP'sTOS for "normal" home Internet access accounts. Any workarounds?

4. My present security router has the capability of establishing a DMZ[ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DMZ_%28computing%29 ] and that wouldobviously be how to best connect the Ooma Telo isolating it totallyfrom the LAN for safety.

But that means the Ooma Telo would still appear to be a server fromthe point-of-view of the Internet with the same caveat as (3).

Any thoughts you have about the above and/or related matters would begreatly appreciated!

Post by Roy[...]One nice thing about OOMA is that there no configuration necessary forthe box in most cases.

Hi Roy,The only documentation I'm seeing is a quick start guide that sort-ofindicates it's a plug'n'play solution with some alternative hookups.Since you have a functioning Ooma Telo, I hope you don't mind answeringa few Qs.1. Lacking spec sheet, my guess is its Ethernet ports are only 10/100.Is that correct?

Yes although I have the older generation box. I believe the new box isalso 10/100.

Post by Thad Floryan2. If one places an Ooma Telo on one's LAN, I'm assuming DHCP will beused by the Telo to acquire a LAN IP and the gateway IP. Is this acorrect assumption or is there, say, a webpage config setup withinthe Ooma Telo to setup its IP, gateway, DNS, and more?

The simple setup is to plug the box in and let it use DHCP which is whatI did.

It does have a router function. You can connect to the "inside" port onthe OOMA and access the box's IP settings and some other features. Ifyou needed to set it to a static address, this would be the way to do it.

I don't know why you would use it as a router. I don't.

Post by Thad Floryan3. If one places an Ooma Telo on one's LAN, that implies port(s) willneed to be opened on one's firewall/router and then it will appearto be a server running at one's home violating many/most/all ISP'sTOS for "normal" home Internet access accounts. Any workarounds?

No changes to your firewall are needed. Plug and play. See below

Post by Thad Floryan4. My present security router has the capability of establishing a DMZ[ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DMZ_%28computing%29 ] and that wouldobviously be how to best connect the Ooma Telo isolating it totallyfrom the LAN for safety.But that means the Ooma Telo would still appear to be a server fromthe point-of-view of the Internet with the same caveat as (3).

Not needed. See below

Post by Thad FloryanAny thoughts you have about the above and/or related matters would begreatly appreciated!Thad

The only "setup" was via the OOMA website to create my account. Otherthan connecting the box, I did nothing to it or my router

OOMA uses its own protocols. The box connects to the OOMA cloud via itsown VPN. That is for control traffic and it stays connected. I only seeUDP traffic when making a call.

The OOMA server I am connecting to is in the Bay Area. Ping time totheir server is 9ms.

As far as my setup, I ignored the router function and the "inside" port.I just plugged its "To Internet" port into my LAN.

I use the OOMA to feed into my legacy phone wiring. All the phones inthe house work as before. I disconnected the landline at the box on theside of the house. That was a simple unplug of a standard modularconnector. I have three conventional phones and a cordless system.

Post by Roy[...]The only "setup" was via the OOMA website to create my account. Otherthan connecting the box, I did nothing to it or my routerOOMA uses its own protocols. The box connects to the OOMA cloud via itsown VPN. That is for control traffic and it stays connected. I only seeUDP traffic when making a call.The OOMA server I am connecting to is in the Bay Area. Ping time totheir server is 9ms.As far as my setup, I ignored the router function and the "inside" port.I just plugged its "To Internet" port into my LAN.I use the OOMA to feed into my legacy phone wiring. All the phones inthe house work as before. I disconnected the landline at the box on theside of the house. That was a simple unplug of a standard modularconnector. I have three conventional phones and a cordless system.

Hi Roy,

WOW! Many thanks for your reply!

What you wrote above has potentially saved me hours of attempting tolocate information on Ooma's website and forums and should be includedon Ooma's home page as a sidebar because you summed it up so nicely!

The Ooma device really appears to be a great plug'n'play device and,though I hate to say this, it's easier to setup a home VoIP with itthan using Asterisk as I've done at client sites before I retired:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asterisk_%28PBX%29

I ordered an Ooma Telo a short while ago from Amazon. If anyoneelse is interested, here's the pricing I found today March 1, 2014to save time:

Post by Thad FloryanThe Ooma device really appears to be a great plug'n'play device and,though I hate to say this, it's easier to setup a home VoIP with ithttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asterisk_%28PBX%29I ordered an Ooma Telo a short while ago from Amazon. If anyoneelse is interested, here's the pricing I found today March 1, 2014Telohttps://go.ooma.com/buy/step1$149.99Telohttp://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002O3W4LE$123.16 + FREE SHIPPINGHD2 Handsethttp://www.amazon.com/ooma-HD2-Handset-Phone-Device/dp/B00A14ZUGE$59.99 + FREE SHIPPINGTelo with Linxhttp://www.costco.com/Ooma-telo-voIP-Free-Home-Phone-Service-with-Linx-.product.11752829.html$139.99http://www.costco.com/Ooma-Telo-VoIP-Free-Home-Phone-Service-with-HD-Handset.product.100085539.html$179.99 with HD2 handset + FREE SHIPPINGTelohttp://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833888002$129.99 + FREE SHIPPINGHD2 handset is out of stockTelohttp://www.frys.com/product/6044048and in-store$129.99 + FREE SHIPPING and available in-storeHD2 Handsethttp://www.frys.com/product/7650717$69.99 + FREE SHIPPINGhttp://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=9511405&type=product&id=1218117369181and in-store http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?id=cat12090&type=page$149.99 + FREE SHIPPING$59.99 for HD2 handsetThad

Costco has them on sale this month. Its a TELO with Linx for $139.99.Nice thing there is if you don't like it, return it.

The handsets are nice but not needed if you are using your legacyphones. I just use the Telo. Also the HD handsets are incompatiblewith the older Telo boxes (and vice versa).

Note that OOMA is not entirely free. There is a $4 or so charge permonth for FCC and state fees.

I went with the "premier" service. It included a free port of my homenumber when you sign for a year. The other very useful premier featureis "backup number". If the cloud loses contact with the box thenincoming calls are automatically forwarded to the backup number.

Post by Thad Floryan[...]Telo with Linxhttp://www.costco.com/Ooma-telo-voIP-Free-Home-Phone-Service-with-Linx-.product.11752829.html[...]

Costco has them on sale this month. Its a TELO with Linx for $139.99.Nice thing there is if you don't like it, return it.

Hi Roy,

Costco is excellent in that regards. The Telo+Linx URL is above andthe sale is good until 3/16/2014.

I didn't see any need for a Linx so getting the "basic" Telo fromAmazon seemed the best deal.

I noted on Ooma's website they now have an "Office" product whichseems to be identical to the Asterisk PBXs I setup for clients wayback when and it appears to be a great deal for SOHO and medium-sized businesses:

Post by RoyI went with the "premier" service. It included a free port of my homenumber when you sign for a year. The other very useful premier featureis "backup number". If the cloud loses contact with the box thenincoming calls are automatically forwarded to the backup number.

I don't have any landline number(s) to port anymore. :-)

Here's an interesting description and a photo of the Telo's innards:

The Ooma Telo is no dumb adapter. It's actually a small, networked-managed, secure Linux computer packed with processing power to keepyour calls clear and reliable.

While searching my archives I found this post from David Arnsteindated Fri, 21 Oct 2011 23:16:41 +0000 (UTC) posted to ba.internetwhich allays concerns about 911 service:

Dave Arnstein wrote:" In article <***@thadlabs.com>," Thad Floryan <***@thadlabs.com> wrote:" >" > It's good to hear confirmation Ooma's service is "solid as a" > rock"; I'm still debating buying a unit -- I don't use the phone" > all that much and I've been cellphone-only since 2002."" If you enjoy working with computers, you could also consider a" "bring your own" VoIP provider. I have been using CallCentric" with a Cisco/Linksys ATA. The latter is the "bring your own"" part."" I did have to fiddle with it quite a bit, but I am getting pretty" good results. It is very cheap. Like Ooma, it has e911 service." This is a nice addition to the e911 service on your cell phone." In particular, the e911 service you get with Ooma and Callcentric" "knows" your street address. Your cell phone e911, not so much."" AT&T POTS service is more reliable than Callcentric, and it" probably beats Ooma as well. But the cost of AT&T service keeps" rising. Since I do most of my blabbing on a cell phone, I" finally had to act.

Post by Thad FloryanWhile searching my archives I found this post from David Arnsteindated Fri, 21 Oct 2011 23:16:41 +0000 (UTC) posted to ba.internet" AT&T POTS service is more reliable than Callcentric, and it" probably beats Ooma as well. But the cost of AT&T service keeps" rising. Since I do most of my blabbing on a cell phone, I" finally had to act.

Right, both Ooma and Callcentric include e911 service. That's whyneither service can be 100% cost free. A small fee must be paid to thegovernment.

I switched from Callcentric to voip.ms about a year ago. Both of theseVoIP services are less reliable than AT&T, for sure. Between your homenetwork and your ISP, you will occasionally experience unintelligibleaudio, and even failure to complete a call. The VoIP service itselfcraps out sometimes as well.

I bailed from Callcentric after 1) a DDoS attack of historic proportions,and 2) a long outage due to flooding in New York City.

I am impressed by Ooma's service, yet I have a concern that kept meaway. Their free service tier is funded entirely by sales of devices.That seems borderline unsustainable to me. What I mean is, Ooma couldgo out of business at any time.

I still think about switching to Ooma Premier. Maybe it is more reliablethan what I have got.

The nice thing about all of these services is that they are so cheap.I might subscribe to Ooma Premier, and keep it running in parallel withvoip.ms for a few months. Let the best box win.

Post by Thad FloryanWhile searching my archives I found this post from David Arnsteindated Fri, 21 Oct 2011 23:16:41 +0000 (UTC) posted to ba.internet" AT&T POTS service is more reliable than Callcentric, and it" probably beats Ooma as well. But the cost of AT&T service keeps" rising. Since I do most of my blabbing on a cell phone, I" finally had to act.

Right, both Ooma and Callcentric include e911 service. That's whyneither service can be 100% cost free. A small fee must be paid to thegovernment.I switched from Callcentric to voip.ms about a year ago. Both of theseVoIP services are less reliable than AT&T, for sure. Between your homenetwork and your ISP, you will occasionally experience unintelligibleaudio, and even failure to complete a call. The VoIP service itselfcraps out sometimes as well.I bailed from Callcentric after 1) a DDoS attack of historic proportions,and 2) a long outage due to flooding in New York City.I am impressed by Ooma's service, yet I have a concern that kept meaway. Their free service tier is funded entirely by sales of devices.That seems borderline unsustainable to me. What I mean is, Ooma couldgo out of business at any time.I still think about switching to Ooma Premier. Maybe it is more reliablethan what I have got.The nice thing about all of these services is that they are so cheap.I might subscribe to Ooma Premier, and keep it running in parallel withvoip.ms for a few months. Let the best box win.

One thing I use in selecting a VOIP provider is the location of theservers. The closer they are, the more likely that your packets getthrough on time.

I have a client on Callcentric. The server is NYC. voip.ms says theyare in LA. As I mentioned, my OOMA box is connected to a server here inthe Bay Area and the company is based in Palo Alto.

I would suspect OOMA reliability will be better.

As far as OOMA finances, you have to look at the company as a whole andnot just focus on the "free tier".

Post by Thad FloryanWhile searching my archives I found this post from David Arnsteindated Fri, 21 Oct 2011 23:16:41 +0000 (UTC) posted to ba.internet" AT&T POTS service is more reliable than Callcentric, and it" probably beats Ooma as well. But the cost of AT&T service keeps" rising. Since I do most of my blabbing on a cell phone, I" finally had to act.

Right, both Ooma and Callcentric include e911 service. That's whyneither service can be 100% cost free. A small fee must be paid to thegovernment.I switched from Callcentric to voip.ms about a year ago. Both of theseVoIP services are less reliable than AT&T, for sure. Between your homenetwork and your ISP, you will occasionally experience unintelligibleaudio, and even failure to complete a call. The VoIP service itselfcraps out sometimes as well.I bailed from Callcentric after 1) a DDoS attack of historic proportions,and 2) a long outage due to flooding in New York City.I am impressed by Ooma's service, yet I have a concern that kept meaway. Their free service tier is funded entirely by sales of devices.That seems borderline unsustainable to me. What I mean is, Ooma couldgo out of business at any time.I still think about switching to Ooma Premier. Maybe it is more reliablethan what I have got.The nice thing about all of these services is that they are so cheap.I might subscribe to Ooma Premier, and keep it running in parallel withvoip.ms for a few months. Let the best box win.

One thing I use in selecting a VOIP provider is the location of theservers. The closer they are, the more likely that your packets getthrough on time.I have a client on Callcentric. The server is NYC. voip.ms says they arein LA. As I mentioned, my OOMA box is connected to a server here in theBay Area and the company is based in Palo Alto.I would suspect OOMA reliability will be better.As far as OOMA finances, you have to look at the company as a whole andnot just focus on the "free tier".It will be interesting to hear about the result of your tests

Post by RoyAs far as OOMA finances, you have to look at the company as a whole andnot just focus on the "free tier".

People are willing to put up with really crappy voice, chopped up by low bitrates and small bandwidth, so it seems that companies can provide voiceservices for next to nothing. Ooma could have enough turnover sellingupgrades that they might have a sustainable business model just by sellingunits.

Post by RoyAs far as OOMA finances, you have to look at the company as a whole andnot just focus on the "free tier".

People are willing to put up with really crappy voice, chopped up by low bitrates and small bandwidth, so it seems that companies can provide voiceservices for next to nothing. Ooma could have enough turnover sellingupgrades that they might have a sustainable business model just by sellingunits.

I have not noticed any of the "crappy voice, chopped up by low bit ratesand small bandwidth". I have a friend that I speak with regularly andhe has had OOMA for years.

I just measured bandwidth during a call and it was about 40 kbps. Thatwould rule out the low speed lossy codecs used by some other cheap services.

Post by Roy[...]I have not noticed any of the "crappy voice, chopped up by low bit ratesand small bandwidth". I have a friend that I speak with regularly andhe has had OOMA for years.I just measured bandwidth during a call and it was about 40 kbps. Thatwould rule out the low speed lossy codecs used by some other cheap services.

Ooma's voice quality demo and specifications here:

http://www.ooma.com/how-ooma-works/voice-quality

strongly suggests I'm going to be in for a treat when my Ooma Teloarrives.

For some reason, probably my /etc/hosts blocking, I cannot play thetwo voice demos directly from the above Ooma web page, so I downloadedthe two MP3s using wget and played them locally using VLC noting wgetpreserves files' original dates and times. MP3 runtimes are both 59seconds:

The voice quality of the "Ooma PureVoice" is reminiscent of the asteriskVoIP system I operated for Levanta (formerly Linuxcare) in San Mateo untilthey went belly-up on March 31, 2008 -- in other words, as good or betterthan landline quality. Here are the two URLs for the above MP3s:

Post by RoyI have not noticed any of the "crappy voice, chopped up by low bit ratesand small bandwidth". I have a friend that I speak with regularly and hehas had OOMA for years.

I wasn't clear about this; I'm actually not saying that Ooma puts out"crappy voice", but that people will put up with just about anything to hearsomeone's voice.

That said, is Ooma good enough to pass 5kHz, aka "broadcast quality" audio?If not, why not? In this day of high speed internet why must a telephoneconnection sounds like a telephone connection? Why shouldn't it sound likebroadcast quality?

Post by RoyI just measured bandwidth during a call and it was about 40 kbps. Thatwould rule out the low speed lossy codecs used by some other cheap services.

Yeah, again I didn't mean to indict Ooma. I haven't heard their audio so Ireally don't know.

Post by Roy[...]I just measured bandwidth during a call and it was about 40 kbps. Thatwould rule out the low speed lossy codecs used by some other cheap services.

Yeah, again I didn't mean to indict Ooma. I haven't heard their audio so Ireally don't know.

VoIP can be subjectively better than landlines as I experiencesoperating asterisk-based VoIPs systems for clients.

And as I wrote earlier in this thread:

[...]Ooma's voice quality demo and specifications here:

http://www.ooma.com/how-ooma-works/voice-quality

strongly suggests I'm going to be in for a treat when my Ooma Teloarrives.

For some reason, probably my /etc/hosts blocking, I cannot play thetwo voice demos directly from the above Ooma web page, so I downloadedthe two MP3s using wget and played them locally using VLC noting wgetpreserves files' original dates and times. MP3 runtimes are both 59seconds:

The voice quality of the "Ooma PureVoice" is reminiscent of the asteriskVoIP system I operated for Levanta (formerly Linuxcare) in San Mateo untilthey went belly-up on March 31, 2008 -- in other words, as good or betterthan landline quality. Here are the two URLs for the above MP3s:

Post by RoyAs far as OOMA finances, you have to look at the company as a whole andnot just focus on the "free tier".

People are willing to put up with really crappy voice, chopped up by lowbit rates and small bandwidth, so it seems that companies can providevoice services for next to nothing. Ooma could have enough turnoverselling upgrades that they might have a sustainable business model just byselling units.

Post by David KayePeople are willing to put up with really crappy voice, chopped up by low

I am surprised at how poor the call can be before people complain.I had a router that was dropping packets. Lots of packets.People on the phone only complained if they really could not understand me.It seems the assumption is that everyone on a phone is driving through themountains on a cell phone, so you take whatever you get.

A company softphone would sometimes go wonky on a conference call, and itseemed like it was when I got excited, maybe talking too loudly.

One coworker would send me an instant message, saying that Darth Vader hadjoined the bridge. We would always comment on each other's voice quality.He on a multitude of gadgets and headsets, me on several differentsoftphones and VoIP adapters, or cell phone, sometimes on Microcell, with avariety of wired and bluetooth headsets.

Post by David KayePeople are willing to put up with really crappy voice, chopped up by low

I am surprised at how poor the call can be before people complain.

Hi Clarence,

Tolerating mediocrity is not a virtue, it's a failing.

A good system (e.g, any of the Asterisk VoIP systems I setup for clients)should be "transparent" with conversation participants sounding like theyare in the room with you. Anything less is crap.

Want a funny story? My best friend worked for the Office of the CTO ofNokia at 955 Page Mill Road in Palo Alto before that division was shutdown (and he moved on to Cisco in San Jose). Whenever they were usingthe Polycom phones in conference everyone had to power down theircellphones due to GSM interference which swamped all conversation.

GSM interference is NOT a laughing matter and we've have some l-o-n-gdiscussions about it in comp.dcom.telecom One instance of the GSMinterference that was really nasty was that it would "accidentally"turn on at FULL an electronic stove in a kitchen and caused a fireas reported in the NY Times (URL is available on request). Thosewearing hearing aids need to be f-a-r away from GSM phones. Etc etc.

I never had that problem with the Asterisk systems I operated/setupand voice quality was subjectively "perfect" and the voice system wassuperior to anything else on the market (vs. the garbage voice mailsystem from AT&T Wireless which is my only complaint about AT&T).

Post by d***@69.usenet.us.com[...]A company softphone would sometimes go wonky on a conference call, and itseemed like it was when I got excited, maybe talking too loudly.

Post by d***@69.usenet.us.comOne coworker would send me an instant message, saying that Darth Vader hadjoined the bridge. We would always comment on each other's voice quality.He on a multitude of gadgets and headsets, me on several differentsoftphones and VoIP adapters, or cell phone, sometimes on Microcell, with avariety of wired and bluetooth headsets.

That sounds like you've been assimilated with implants by the Borg. :-)

The first softphone I used was from Cisco, very expensive per seat. Theonscreen presentation looked just like a picture of the Cisco VoIP phone onmy desk. That always worked fine. We had a server inhouse, and separatenetworking for the phones.

I have since used softphones from Vonage, CallVantage, Skype, and Lotus.None as good as the Cisco.

Post by Thad FloryanThe Ooma device really appears to be a great plug'n'play device and,though I hate to say this, it's easier to setup a home VoIP with it

I went with the "premier" service. It included a free port of my homenumber when you sign for a year. The other very useful premier featureis "backup number". If the cloud loses contact with the box thenincoming calls are automatically forwarded to the backup number.

I'm another satisfied Ooma customer. I had to dig up my number portemail where I ported from AT&T to Ooma. It was November 2009.

It was really bad for about a year or so, then the service became stableto the point that I don't think about it. We probably don't even need itany longer except that the sound quality is just very good for extendedphone calls -- so much better than cellular.

I've been on the premier tier for $10/mo the whole time which givesfeatures like a second number with custom ring, flexible forwarding,blacklisting. They recently freed up their iOS app (was $10 with badreviews - I never bought it). Now it's free and quite decent. It evenhas a softphone for outbound calls that ID back to the home number. It'shandy for making calls from the iPhone when cell service is out but wifiis in.

I am still using the original pre-Telo hardware (the main device and theremove "scouts").

I use Google Voice - going back to the Grand Central days - as myuniversal contact number. That way my calls ring my iPhone, my PagePlusphone and my Ooma secondary line.

Basic Talk says $11/month with fees. Ooma is $4 (all fees).So the box pays for itself in a year abd a half or so.

Post by d***@69.usenet.us.comI already had a cordless base set that I plugged in to the Vonage Adapter.I think it was a three handset unit at Walmart for about $50.Vonage includes one "Extension", an app you can run on a cellphone (not mytablet though, it needs a SIM). That allows WiFi calls.

Post by RoyBasic Talk says $11/month with fees. Ooma is $4 (all fees).So the box pays for itself in a year abd a half or so.

I missed that Ooma was "free", but that gets back to the business modelquestion. Not only do I not trust "free", I would rather have someonemaking money on my business, so they stay in business.

Post by RoyBTW, Vonage (the $30/mo version) is a clear winner if you make a lot ofinternational calls.

I used to pay the full fare so that I could have a Vonage softphone on myPC. I never actually used the adapter.

Does Ooma not do International? Or do they charge too much?All of this comes _after_ my daughter was in Mongolia, when we would saveup our pennies for one phone call per month. None worked worth a darnexcept AT&T.

That might have been before Ooma, and my eyes got blurry trying to figureout how to cobble something together on my own.

Post by RoyBasic Talk says $11/month with fees. Ooma is $4 (all fees).So the box pays for itself in a year abd a half or so.

I missed that Ooma was "free", but that gets back to the business modelquestion. Not only do I not trust "free", I would rather have someonemaking money on my business, so they stay in business.

Post by RoyBTW, Vonage (the $30/mo version) is a clear winner if you make a lot ofinternational calls.

I used to pay the full fare so that I could have a Vonage softphone on myPC. I never actually used the adapter.Does Ooma not do International? Or do they charge too much?All of this comes _after_ my daughter was in Mongolia, when we would saveup our pennies for one phone call per month. None worked worth a darnexcept AT&T.That might have been before Ooma, and my eyes got blurry trying to figureout how to cobble something together on my own.

The cost for the Ooma Telo box is a one-time expense. Then themonthly costs are less than $4/month as I wrote previously:"" The fees are based on ZIP code; for ZIP 94024 (South Los Altos) it's" these per the calculator at http://ooma.com/how-ooma-works/savings"" Regulatory Compliance $1.78" 911 Service $1.59" Federal Universal Service Charge $0.42" State and local taxes and fees $0.12" =====" $3.91/month

Two years (24 months):

Vonage: 24 x $9.95 = $238.80

Ooma: 24 x $3.91 = $ 93.84

$238.80 - $93.84 = $144.96 which is more than the $123.16 cost of theOoma box I bought at Amazon this past Saturday.

So, in 2 years Vonage costs more than Ooma and as the duration increasesVonage becomes much more expensive than Ooma.

Thus, Vonage seems pricey. :-)

Post by d***@69.usenet.us.comI already had a cordless base set that I plugged in to the Vonage Adapter.I think it was a three handset unit at Walmart for about $50.

Looking at the "How it works" at the Vonage website you cited, it's notclear the Vonage can support an entire home's existing telco wiring withmultiple instruments as Ooma can -- that capability is important to me.

Post by d***@69.usenet.us.comVonage includes one "Extension", an app you can run on a cellphone (not mytablet though, it needs a SIM). That allows WiFi calls.

Ooma supports 4 "extensions" (via a Linx) which I don't care about and it alsohas an optional featurefull controller handset which I might buy later, butI'm not a "heavy" phone user anymore -- I just wanted a better phone connectionthan cellphone and a good e911 system and Ooma provides both (and more withtheir Premium service).

Ooma has two service levels: free and premier. Vonage has two levelstoo: basictalk and Vonage regular.

Vonage also tacks on fees so they need to be included with your costcomparison

Ooma also has an app for making calls from your smartphone as well.There may be costs involved based on your platform and subscription.Note that Vonage ($29.95/month) has the app and not the "basictalk"version of Vonage.

Hi Clarence,The cost for the Ooma Telo box is a one-time expense. Then the"" The fees are based on ZIP code; for ZIP 94024 (South Los Altos) it's" these per the calculator at http://ooma.com/how-ooma-works/savings"" Regulatory Compliance $1.78" 911 Service $1.59" Federal Universal Service Charge $0.42" State and local taxes and fees $0.12" =====" $3.91/monthVonage: 24 x $9.95 = $238.80Ooma: 24 x $3.91 = $ 93.84$238.80 - $93.84 = $144.96 which is more than the $123.16 cost of theOoma box I bought at Amazon this past Saturday.So, in 2 years Vonage costs more than Ooma and as the duration increasesVonage becomes much more expensive than Ooma.Thus, Vonage seems pricey. :-)

Post by d***@69.usenet.us.comI already had a cordless base set that I plugged in to the Vonage Adapter.I think it was a three handset unit at Walmart for about $50.

Looking at the "How it works" at the Vonage website you cited, it's notclear the Vonage can support an entire home's existing telco wiring withmultiple instruments as Ooma can -- that capability is important to me.

Post by d***@69.usenet.us.comVonage includes one "Extension", an app you can run on a cellphone (not mytablet though, it needs a SIM). That allows WiFi calls.

Ooma supports 4 "extensions" (via a Linx) which I don't care about and it alsohas an optional featurefull controller handset which I might buy later, butI'm not a "heavy" phone user anymore -- I just wanted a better phone connectionthan cellphone and a good e911 system and Ooma provides both (and more withtheir Premium service).Thad

Post by Thad FloryanLooking at the "How it works" at the Vonage website you cited, it's notclear the Vonage can support an entire home's existing telco wiring withmultiple instruments as Ooma can -- that capability is important to me.

Not sure what you mean by "support". We had Vonage once before, and hadthe unit cabled to the existing house wiring, with three phones, and a fewDirecTV boxes.

Post by Thad FloryanLooking at the "How it works" at the Vonage website you cited, it's notclear the Vonage can support an entire home's existing telco wiring withmultiple instruments as Ooma can -- that capability is important to me.

Not sure what you mean by "support". We had Vonage once before, and hadthe unit cabled to the existing house wiring, with three phones, and a fewDirecTV boxes.

Hi Clarence,

I didn't see anything during a quick perusal of Vonage's website; thanksfor clarifying that.

Post by Thad FloryanLooking at the "How it works" at the Vonage website you cited, it's notclear the Vonage can support an entire home's existing telco wiring withmultiple instruments as Ooma can -- that capability is important to me.

Not sure what you mean by "support". We had Vonage once before, and hadthe unit cabled to the existing house wiring, with three phones, and a fewDirecTV boxes.

I used to have Vonage and did the same as you. Simply disconnect the homephone wiring at the telco demarc, then plug the Phone jack of the Vonageadapter into any convenient phone jack to light up the entire home.

Post by Thad FloryanLooking at the "How it works" at the Vonage website you cited, it's notclear the Vonage can support an entire home's existing telco wiring withmultiple instruments as Ooma can -- that capability is important to me.

Not sure what you mean by "support". We had Vonage once before, and hadthe unit cabled to the existing house wiring, with three phones, and a fewDirecTV boxes.

I used to have Vonage and did the same as you. Simply disconnect the homephone wiring at the telco demarc, then plug the Phone jack of the Vonageadapter into any convenient phone jack to light up the entire home.

A problem that can occur if the VOIP box can't supply enough power tooperate all the phones. This shows up with the inability to ring allthe phones (especially older ones). Another symptom would be low soundif multiple phones are off hook.

Those of us old enough to remember back to the days where the phonecompany charged for extensions. They could measure the power drawn andcalculate how many phones were ringing. A common trick was to open theextension phone and disconnect the bell.

Post by RoyThose of us old enough to remember back to the days where the phonecompany charged for extensions. They could measure the power drawn andcalculate how many phones were ringing. A common trick was to open theextension phone and disconnect the bell.

I remember connecting my first cordless phone, from Radio Shack.I had to call Pac Bell, give them the FCC ID number, and when I told themthe REN was 1.0, they said I had exceeded my allowed ringer count, eventhough nothing else was connected. I think that was a bluff, and wonderedif they could tell, or ever bothered to try to tell.

Post by d***@69.usenet.us.comI remember connecting my first cordless phone, from Radio Shack.I had to call Pac Bell, give them the FCC ID number, and when I told themthe REN was 1.0, they said I had exceeded my allowed ringer count, eventhough nothing else was connected. I think that was a bluff, and wonderedif they could tell, or ever bothered to try to tell.

They may well have checked. They were (maybe still are) concernedthat there's not too much current off the battery. Sometimes folkswould power a light bulb (or something) of the phone line ifthey had not paid their PG&E bill recently.

REN = Ringer Equivalence Number and that number is "somewhere"on every piece of telco gear I have and it's usually on theunderside of equipment alongside the part number and other info.

RENs are additive so if there were three phones on the line withRENs of 0.5, 1 and 1.5 the total load would be 3.0 REN.

Just about everything I have has a REN of 0.0 or 0.1 except foran AT&T CS2500DMGH (aka a Touch-Tone 500) whose REN is statedon the label on the underside as "0.4A, 0.78" and there's a PacBellwallphone in the kitchen whose REN I haven't checked yet since myimmediate priority is to clean up the demarc.

Post by RoyAnother symptom would be low sound if multiple phones are off hook.

Older phones and electronics could present that problem. A Plantronicsheadset phone I have (Model SP-4) lists its REN as '0.0B' -- yes, that'sa 'B' and not an '8' as I just now checked using a magnifying glass.

Post by RoyThose of us old enough to remember back to the days where the phonecompany charged for extensions. They could measure the power drawn andcalculate how many phones were ringing. A common trick was to open theextension phone and disconnect the bell.

Another trick "way back when" was to reverse the red and green wires inthe block on the wall to give oneself Touch-Tone service which was pricedat $2.50/month circa 1960s and 1970s even though the CO could handle bothwithout any difficulty. :-)

Earlier today I connected my old Plantronics SP-04 headsetphone (REN = 0.0B) to the Ooma Telo and it worked perfectlyand I used it to activate a CC which arrived in yesterday'spostal mail.

After cleaning it up (since I bought it in July 1998) Ithen connected my CIDCO SA-99A-22 Caller ID unit betweenthe Ooma Telo and the Plantronics headset and called theOoma from my AT&T Wireless cell phone.

Whoa! It worked perfectly and a 3-line CID display appearedon the unit's LCD display:

1: 650-###-#### my cellphone's number2: FLORYAN THADDEU name presumably from AT&T Wireless'database; no room on the LCD to showthe S" at the end of THADDEUS3: Date and time of the beginning of the call

and the date and time is now correctly set in the CID unitwhich has a builtin battery backup (standard 9VDC battery)so the database of the last 99 callers isn't lost. I alsoput the CID external PSU on the same UPS as several of mycritical LAN services.

And not only that, the CID UNIT picked up on the Ooma'sVoice Mail status and it's displaying "MESSAGE WAITING" alongwith a blinking red LED in unison with the blinking icon onthe Ooma Telo.

Have you ever heard the expression: "Happy Camper" ?

That's what I am right now!

It's rare that I pat myself on the back for doing something good,and the purchase of the Ooma Telo is just such an occasion.

Post by Thad FloryanEarlier today I connected my old Plantronics SP-04 headsetphone (REN = 0.0B) to the Ooma Telo and it worked perfectlyand I used it to activate a CC which arrived in yesterday'spostal mail.After cleaning it up (since I bought it in July 1998) Ithen connected my CIDCO SA-99A-22 Caller ID unit betweenthe Ooma Telo and the Plantronics headset and called theOoma from my AT&T Wireless cell phone.Whoa! It worked perfectly and a 3-line CID display appeared1: 650-###-#### my cellphone's number2: FLORYAN THADDEU name presumably from AT&T Wireless'database; no room on the LCD to showthe S" at the end of THADDEUS3: Date and time of the beginning of the call...

Item #1 is the CID (Caller ID). This is provided by the originationphone company and passed along with the call.

Item #2 is the CNAM (Caller Name). It does NOT come along with the callfrom the originator.

Seeing the CNAM can cost extra. Its like checking you bag for theplane. Fees mean revenue. CNAM is part of the Ooma premier level. Anew subscriber gets free access to premier for two months.

The CNAM info can come from one of several places.

1) There are CNAM databases that hold the info. This is where yourphone company puts the data in. The database is paid for by fees whenquerying it which is another reason for the fees. The destination phonecompany can look up the CID in the database and get the CNAM and send itto your phone.

2) There may be s lookup function in the phone. When my wife calls mycell, I see the entry from the phone's address book and not the CNAMdatabase.

3) The phone company can maintain an address book for you and look it up

Post by RoyNote that this is for the name (CNAM). There is a different option toturn off outbound callerid (CID). The feature is "Caller ID Blocking" onthis web page

I have no problem with the called party knowing my name, but I've hadsituations where I've called a place for info and then gotten a return callfrom their sales force. I really don't want them addressing me by nameif/when they call back.

Post by Thad Floryan[...]$238.80 - $93.84 = $144.96 which is more than the $123.16 cost of theOoma box I bought at Amazon this past Saturday.[...]

First time ever any problems with Amazon. I bought the Ooma Telo onSaturday 1 March 2014 with free shipping delivery stated to be today,Thursday, 6 March 2014.

But I never received a shipping notice email, and logging in to myAmazon account has been showing "Preparing for Shipment" the past 5days and nothing had been debited from my card as of 12noon today.

So I cancelled the Amazon order and ordered the Ooma Telo from Neweggat 12:33pm today, the payment was debited within seconds, and just afew minutes ago I received shipping and tracking info via OnTrac whichmeans 1 day in the 8 Western states served by OnTrac so I'll have theOoma Telo very likely tomorrow and that's free Newegg shipping. TheNewegg price for the Ooma Telo was only several dollars more than Amazon.

Has anyone else experienced such a shipping issue from Amazon? FWIW,Amazon "free" shipping normally means 2-3 days in my experience.

Post by Thad Floryan[...]$238.80 - $93.84 = $144.96 which is more than the $123.16 cost of theOoma box I bought at Amazon this past Saturday.[...]

First time ever any problems with Amazon. I bought the Ooma Telo onSaturday 1 March 2014 with free shipping delivery stated to be today,Thursday, 6 March 2014.But I never received a shipping notice email, and logging in to myAmazon account has been showing "Preparing for Shipment" the past 5days and nothing had been debited from my card as of 12noon today.So I cancelled the Amazon order and ordered the Ooma Telo from Neweggat 12:33pm today, the payment was debited within seconds, and just afew minutes ago I received shipping and tracking info via OnTrac whichmeans 1 day in the 8 Western states served by OnTrac so I'll have theOoma Telo very likely tomorrow and that's free Newegg shipping. TheNewegg price for the Ooma Telo was only several dollars more than Amazon.Has anyone else experienced such a shipping issue from Amazon? FWIW,Amazon "free" shipping normally means 2-3 days in my experience.

I'm experiencing one now. A two day Prime shipment was supposed to comeyesterday via OnTrac but it's still not here. "Expected delivery:Wednesday, March 5, 2014, by 8:00pm." If it's not here by tomorrow I'llcancel it and order from Newegg.

Post by Thad Floryan[...]First time ever any problems with Amazon. I bought the Ooma Telo onSaturday 1 March 2014 with free shipping delivery stated to be today,Thursday, 6 March 2014.But I never received a shipping notice email, and logging in to myAmazon account has been showing "Preparing for Shipment" the past 5days and nothing had been debited from my card as of 12noon today.So I cancelled the Amazon order and ordered the Ooma Telo from Newegg[...]

I'm experiencing one now. A two day Prime shipment was supposed to comeWednesday, March 5, 2014, by 8:00pm." If it's not here by tomorrow I'llcancel it and order from Newegg.[...]

Hi Steven,

Google isn't finding anything about Amazon shipping in 2014 but thereare the ton of hits for last December's holiday shipping delay fiascos.

The "funny" thing is that ever since I made the Amazon purchase lastSaturday my online checking account was showing "Processing" for theAmazon purchase until today when it disappeared online. That's whenI realized I wouldn't have a problem [at my bank] canceling the orderand so I did and then I bought from Newegg which has gone smoothly asusual.

The symptoms I'm seeing strongly suggest a failure at Amazon. GivenI have no knowledge of their internal operations, speculation wouldbe futile. I've seen nothing about the Amazon problem in any of theonline newspapers that I frequent daily, either.

Post by Thad Floryan[...]So I cancelled the Amazon order and ordered the Ooma Telo from Neweggat 12:33pm today, the payment was debited within seconds, and just afew minutes ago I received shipping and tracking info via OnTrac whichmeans 1 day in the 8 Western states served by OnTrac so I'll have theOoma Telo very likely tomorrow and that's free Newegg shipping. TheNewegg price for the Ooma Telo was only several dollars more than Amazon.[...]

Newegg and OnTrac never cease to amaze: I received the package at 1:05pmtoday -- that's Newegg 1-day free shipping; tracking record (1 page, 40kB):

http://thadlabs.com/FILES/OnTrac_20140307_delivered.pdf

Overnight from Commerce CA (near LA) to Silicon Valley is per Googling:

distance from commerce california to menlo park california

5 hours 32 minutes, 366.5 miles

Thinking back to the symptoms I saw regarding Amazon's failure, theproblem appears to have been their billing system wasn't interfacingproperly with the account I charged (though it's worked many times justfine in the past) and the disappearance yesterday of that pending chargefrom the online site confirms it since the billing never occurred after5 days so there was nothing shipped which is why I never received anyemail with shipping info; fortunately it was so easy to cancel the order.

I wonder if Steven (sms) noticed a similar symptom with his "missing"order.

And I wonder if Amazon was hacked again? After the Target fiasco nothingwould surprise me anymore.

Post by Thad Floryan[...]So I cancelled the Amazon order and ordered the Ooma Telo from Neweggat 12:33pm today, the payment was debited within seconds, and just afew minutes ago I received shipping and tracking info via OnTrac whichmeans 1 day in the 8 Western states served by OnTrac so I'll have theOoma Telo very likely tomorrow and that's free Newegg shipping. TheNewegg price for the Ooma Telo was only several dollars more than Amazon.[...]

Newegg and OnTrac never cease to amaze: I received the package at 1:05pmhttp://thadlabs.com/FILES/OnTrac_20140307_delivered.pdfdistance from commerce california to menlo park california5 hours 32 minutes, 366.5 milesThinking back to the symptoms I saw regarding Amazon's failure, theproblem appears to have been their billing system wasn't interfacingproperly with the account I charged (though it's worked many times justfine in the past) and the disappearance yesterday of that pending chargefrom the online site confirms it since the billing never occurred after5 days so there was nothing shipped which is why I never received anyemail with shipping info; fortunately it was so easy to cancel the order.I wonder if Steven (sms) noticed a similar symptom with his "missing"order.And I wonder if Amazon was hacked again? After the Target fiasco nothingwould surprise me anymore.

Now Amazon tells me that the delay is because the package got sent tothe wrong carrier. It is coming via OnTrac. Probably got given to UPSwho returned it.

OnTrac is indeed amazing. I like that they deliver early in the morning,before I leave the house, unlike UPS which typically delivers in myneighborhood 7:30-8:30 p.m.

Monoprice also delivers next-day. They use "Norco" for California,Arizona, and Nevada.

Post by Thad Floryan[...]Newegg and OnTrac never cease to amaze: I received the package at 1:05pmtoday ...[...]

Wow! Voice quality is excellent and, as Roy wrote earlier in a relatedthread, it's a no-brainer plug-n-play solution that "just works".

The Telo firmware updated itself upon first powerup and it was fast dueto my Comcast cable connection.

It took a while to find some of my old phones with a low REN and I seeI need to get a new foam earpiece cover for my Plantronics headset (fortruly hands-free phone usage at the keyboard) -- the old foam crumbledto dust after 12 years in a box in my garage.

I still need to cutback a large hedge to get to the old PacBell demarcsso I can disconnect them and have the Ooma be the sole interface withthe phones [that will soon be re-connected] on the primary internalhouse telco line (I used to have 4 land lines, 3 of which went only tomy home office for an HP FAX machine and 2 modems/voice lines.

Post by d***@69.usenet.us.com[...]sms jinxed it.The site is still there in April, but I received email notifying me that myplan was ending."During May 2014, the Vonage BasicTalk promotional calling plan will nolonger be available. Effective with your 04/10/2014 bill cycle, you will beupgraded to our Vonage Preferred U.S. & Canada Unlimited calling plan, anew _exclusive_ home phone service plan at an $11.99/month rate (plustaxes). "Looking back at the original site, I see "$9.99 every month". Not "$9.99until we send you an email that says differently."

I just had my first Ooma autopay debited from my checking accountfor the incredibly massive amount of $3.94 on April 11, 2014, onemonth after I initiated the free service.

That $3.94 is solely the 911 fees and all taxes. That's for excellentquality free VoIP throughout the USA. I may elect to upgrade to thePremier service, $9.99/month, for its other features when the 2-monthfree trial of Premier expires:

http://www.ooma.com/

http://www.ooma.com/products

http://www.ooma.com/products/basic the free service

http://www.ooma.com/products/premier

To say the least, I'm very impressed with Ooma's service and I'mstill incredulous the Ooma Telo device is acting like a telco COand providing a Ringer Equivalence Number (REN) of 5.0 servicingall the phones in my home along with a standard dial tone afterthe short Ooma "dialtone" upon off-hook.

The phone instruments presently connected to my Ooma Telo are:

- Plantronics SP-04 headset phone with a Cidco SA-99A-22caller ID box with 99 number memory and backlight in myhome office

- PacBell wallphone with Caller ID in my kitchen

- Western Electric 2500 with backlit keys in my bedroon

I'm still examining reader reviews of other phones because I wantone more for another room in the house. It's critical to be surea new landline phone doesn't use expensive exotic batteries, havea backlit LCD display, and have a Caller ID Memory along with anindicator showing there are Voice Mail messages waiting.

Yes, the Ooma uses standard, "everyday" landline phones vs the veryexpensive VoIP phones such as a Cisco 7960 or equivalent.

sms jinxed it.The site is still there in April, but I received email notifying me that myplan was ending."During May 2014, the Vonage BasicTalk promotional calling plan will nolonger be available. Effective with your 04/10/2014 bill cycle, you will beupgraded to our Vonage Preferred U.S. & Canada Unlimited calling plan, anew _exclusive_ home phone service plan at an $11.99/month rate (plustaxes). "Looking back at the original site, I see "$9.99 every month". Not "$9.99until we send you an email that says differently."

sms jinxed it.The site is still there in April, but I received email notifying me that myplan was ending."During May 2014, the Vonage BasicTalk promotional calling plan will nolonger be available. Effective with your 04/10/2014 bill cycle, you will beupgraded to our Vonage Preferred U.S. & Canada Unlimited calling plan, anew _exclusive_ home phone service plan at an $11.99/month rate (plustaxes). "Looking back at the original site, I see "$9.99 every month". Not "$9.99until we send you an email that says differently."

Sorry.

The good news is that you are now going to be on a "new _exclusive_"service; you should feel very special.

Gotta love that number portability.(That drove me nuts as a small carrier, where we rented space on a switchin Oakland that was also rented to our competitors. If someone ported fromone of us to the other, especially with someone else in between, thebilling would wind up on the wrong Telco, which would make for iratecustomers.)

I'm not ready to jump off the Vonage wagon yet, and if I do, it wouldprobably be back to Mediacom for two years.

Right after I use my Vonage "Extension" to make some calls in Europe thissummer.

By then, we'll see if Ooma is still high on the list for sms and Thad.

Post by d***@69.usenet.us.com[...]I'm not ready to jump off the Vonage wagon yet, and if I do, it wouldprobably be back to Mediacom for two years.Right after I use my Vonage "Extension" to make some calls in Europe thissummer.By then, we'll see if Ooma is still high on the list for sms and Thad.

Hi Clarence,

Add Roy to the list.

Though I've been "looking" at Ooma for over 6 years I justdidn't have enough incentive to change my cellphone-onlystance after abandoning PacBell landlines in 2002.

Roy's comments about 5-6 weeks ago plus my need to contacta service for a water heater replacement plus my need tocontact the Santa Clara County Tax Collectors office re:removing items from my tax bill finally were the incentivesI needed to get Ooma so I could use my Plantronics headsetphone hands free while also using a computer keyboard.

I had called over 80 so-called water heater plumbing companiesall of whom rudely hung up after I asked for a quote and thatwas becoming annoying using my cellphone.*

I had been on hold for over an hour some days attempting to contactthe Tax Collector and that was becoming annoying and frustratingusing my cell phone especially when the battery would depleteafter being on hold.

So I got the Ooma and I'm kicking myself for not doing it earlier.

Ooma's voice quality is exemplary and as good or better than theAsterisk systems I've setup for clients over the years which werebetter than PacBell's landlines and I'm simply flabbergasted thatthe Ooma setup was so easy with BIG thanks to Roy for his testsand comments -- it was simply a plug'n'play on my LAN followed bya simple setup at Ooma: choose a phone number, billing info, E911info, then later the Voice Mail setup (e.g., greeting, etc).

Now here's something strange: it seems Roy and I bought the OomaTelo at the "right" time because there's a new model Telo thatappears to be stripped down and I cannot find a manual for it butphotos of both are here for comparison:

http://www.ooma.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=17120

and another picture of the "new" Telo can be seen on this page:

http://www.ooma.com/products

It doesn't have as many buttons as the model that Roy and I boughtand it's not clear what's on the back panel. This probably explainswhy the model that Roy and I bought had a price reduction from Amazon,Newegg, et al a month or so ago. I'm not complaining and I'm verypleased with the model I have.

Thad

* the company that did provide me a quote and a special financingarrangement [I'm retired now] and spent an incredible 9 hours from9am until 6pm with only a short lunch break on March 10 bringingeverything up to code with a new gas line, superior drain pan, allcopper piping, etc etc etc and including an "infinite" warranty isthis one whose work replacing the old heater (a Bradford-White40-gallon which lasted 4 years beyond its 10-year warranty) and madeit all looking like a work of art is:

http://www.mikecounsilplumbing.com/

for whom I have the highest respect for quality of work *AND* goodbusiness practices (i.e., not hanging up on me when I asked for aballpark quote so I could have money transferred into my checkingaccount).

Post by Thad FloryanI had called over 80 so-called water heater plumbing companiesall of whom rudely hung up after I asked for a quote [...]* the company that did provide me a quote and a special financingarrangement [I'm retired now] and spent an incredible 9 hours from9am until 6pm with only a short lunch break on March 10 bringingeverything up to code with a new gas line, superior drain pan, allcopper piping, etc etc etc and including an "infinite" warranty isthis one whose work replacing the old heater (a Bradford-White40-gallon which lasted 4 years beyond its 10-year warranty) and madehttp://www.mikecounsilplumbing.com/for whom I have the highest respect for quality of work *AND* goodbusiness practices (i.e., not hanging up on me when I asked for aballpark quote so I could have money transferred into my checkingaccount).

I'm glad you found a good plumber, and am a little shocked atthe "over 80" number.

I've swapped out water heaters twice, and had a new tanklessone installed recently (which involved replumbing both gasand water lines)... any plumber should be able to do itand should give you an idea of the cost.

Post by Thad FloryanI had called over 80 so-called water heater plumbing companiesall of whom rudely hung up after I asked for a quote [...][...]http://www.mikecounsilplumbing.com/[...]

I'm glad you found a good plumber, and am a little shocked atthe "over 80" number.

Hi Steve,

I was frustrated beyond belief with the attitude of so manyplumbing operations and breathed a deep sigh of relief whenthe company (above URL) demonstrated sound business practice.

The plumbing company with which I'd done business for over40 years no longer exists in the same form -- it's now justone technician and apparently his girlfriend answering thephone in a surly tone.

The company whose URL is above didn't even pop up in anysearch I did and I found it solely looking at Yelp and sawthey service Mountain View and Los Altos but there were noreviews at all. At that point I called them really out ofdesperation and they came through with flying colors.

If there was a place from which I could buy a water heatermy best friend and I could probably have installed it butthe code issues, new gas piping arrangement, etc. made meuncomfortable though my friend had once installed a waterheater in his home in Palo Alto and is likely to be soonin need of a replacement for that one.

I have another water heater (also 40 gallons) at the otherend of the house which still has 4 years left on warrantyand if it acts like the one that was just replaced 4 yearsafter its 10-year warranty expired I'll be in fine shapefor awhile and will have the above company replace that one,too, when it's time.

Don't laugh too hard, but I had 15 3"x6"x1" sponges on thefloor surrounding the leaking water heater and I'd squeezethem out once a day into a bucket during the period I wasseeking a plumber -- fortunately it was a slow leak from thebottom of the heater whereas prior heaters just blew theirguts out with the water escaping out the emergency drain.

Post by Steve PopeI've swapped out water heaters twice, and had a new tanklessone installed recently (which involved replumbing both gasand water lines)... any plumber should be able to do itand should give you an idea of the cost.

That's why I was shocked calling so many "services" and beingrudely hung-up-upon -- I never expected there to be some kindof "plumbing cabal" conspiracy among all the local plumbingshops who withhold all their pricing secrets until one givesthem their firstborn. Or something like that. :-)

In any event, I'm happy to have found a reputable service andI hope they can be of service to others in need, too.

Refrigerators are another issue and I was surprised to learn8 years ago that many folks replace theirs after 10 yearswhether they need to do so or not. Long story short, myprevious fridge went belly up (losing about $300 worth offood) and getting a replacement normally would take a week.I finally contacted Meyer Electric in Mountain View andthey also stated 1 week for a new fridge but I couldn't waitand they accommodated me by selling and delivering one thesame day from their showroom floor. They, too, are a greatcompany to deal with.

Post by Thad FloryanThe company whose URL is above didn't even pop up in anysearch I did and I found it solely looking at Yelp and sawthey service Mountain View and Los Altos but there were noreviews at all. At that point I called them really out ofdesperation and they came through with flying colors.

Many of the very best businesses do not use websites. For myself I have twowebsites (they focus just a little differently), but I can't say that I'veever gotten more than about 5 clients in total from them.

I know an excellent commercial plumber. He does bars, restaurants, andother smaller commercial jobs. He has been in business for about 15 years,provides reliable service, and has never had a website. He does McDonald's,several bars in SF, etc., and gets new leads via word of mouth. He candesign plumbing systems, tear up concrete and replace mains, etc., but as Isaid, he has never had a website.

I know two cabinet makers, a metal worker who installs awnings andhandrails, a guy who does upscale kitchen remodels, a karaoke jockey, and apersonal chef -- and none of them have websites, either.

Given the difficulty I've had in driving people to my websites and given theexcellent word of mouth I've gotten over the years, it's easy to see whysome of the most successful business people, especially those in the trades,don't even BOTHER to have websites.

Post by Thad Floryan[..]Refrigerators are another issue and I was surprised to learn8 years ago that many folks replace theirs after 10 yearswhether they need to do so or not. Long story short, myprevious fridge went belly up (losing about $300 worth offood) and getting a replacement normally would take a week.I finally contacted Meyer Electric in Mountain View andthey also stated 1 week for a new fridge but I couldn't waitand they accommodated me by selling and delivering one thesame day from their showroom floor. They, too, are a greatcompany to deal with.

I erred, its name is/was Meyer Appliance not Meyer Electric.

I wanted to look up their address for my records and discoveredthey've moved from Castro Street in Mountain View to what seemsto be Sunnyvale but is, in fact, still Mountain View just eastof Hwy 237 at their new location on El Camino:

Post by Thad FloryanSince you have a functioning Ooma Telo, I hope you don't mind answeringa few Qs.

It is probably similar to the Vonage box.It works plugged in behind my cable modem - router - Vonage.It has a locally assigned DHCP address.

On the upstream sideNmap scan report for 192.168.56.102 Vonage, taken with -PnHost is up (0.015s latency).Not shown: 999 filtered portsPORT STATE SERVICE10000/tcp closed snet-sensor-mgmt

It has a passthrough port, with a web interface available on the LAN side.The web interface offers various firewall-ish features, and I have onedevice downstream that doesn't seem to care that it winds up with adouble-NAT for my purposes.

Post by Thad Floryan2. If one places an Ooma Telo on one's LAN, I'm assuming DHCP will beused by the Telo to acquire a LAN IP and the gateway IP. Is this acorrect assumption or is there, say, a webpage config setup withinthe Ooma Telo to setup its IP, gateway, DNS, and more?

The web interface is only available on the LAN side, but I don't recallthat there is anything there that you need to visit.

Post by Thad Floryan3. If one places an Ooma Telo on one's LAN, that implies port(s) willneed to be opened on one's firewall/router and then it will appear

Maybe the Vonage adapter opens an outbound connection to a server and keepsit open for incoming calls. I have no incoming port forwarding set, andUPnP is disabled.

Post by d***@08.usenet.us.comI never understood the business model of "free". Advertising onlygoes sofar, and I never click on any of the Google ads.

Many ads are sold on impressions and not on clicks. When a moviecomes out,you're likely to see graphics in a banner ad and maybe a trailer for themovie on many web portals such as Yahoo. No need to click through.

This is the "you get what you pay for" model. People complain when theirfree services have problems, but refuse to pay even a small amount tosubscribe to something.

In the case of Google Voice, people would be happy to pay a small amountfor the service to continue as it had. They'd also be happy to pay forthe ability to do international forwarding. Google doesn't want to be inthis business anymore.What is annoying is that Google Voice essentially drove several otherservices out of business by providing an equivalent service for free.That said, there are still fee for service VOIP providers that offerfair prices and good quality with a non-proprietary system. Vonage isnot one of those providers. Callcentric is fairly priced. Well for aproprietary system, at $9.99, Vonage isn't bad (though Ooma is less) but$9.99 is not a price that you can sign up for. It's always amusing whensomeone proclaims that a particular service is a great deal when theyare getting a price obtainable only by being grandfathered in, or bycontinuously threatening to unsubscribe.

OOMA is less than $4/month and seems to work just fine. A friend hashad it for years and I finally added it here and switched my landlinenumber to it.One nice thing about OOMA is that there no configuration necessary forthe box in most cases.

I have Obihai 100 which is still working even though it is May 17. The nice thing about the Obi is that (so far) you can dial right on the hand set instead of dialing through GV. I have a free Callcentric number from New York (all in-coming calls are free) and use their 911e service for $1.50 per month. I also have a Cisco adapter coupled with Callcentric at another place which will continue to work -- even when Google discontinues the xmpp service, but I have to dial using the Google Voice website (my google site) -- and (except for the 911 fee) calling and receiving calls is completely free.

I also have two Android devices (a htc phone and a Nexus 7) from which I can call any phone in the US for free. I use the free Groove IP Lite app which is now working with another company which gives you a free phone number -- and free calls (receiving and outgoing). So Google's actions haven't stopped people from calling for free at all.

Post by smsproprietary system, at $9.99, Vonage isn't bad (though Ooma is less) but$9.99 is not a price that you can sign up for. It's always amusing when

"For 2013, the Company reported a positive swing of nearly 25,000 net lineadditions compared to the prior year, aided by the addition of subscribersto BasicTalk, "

http://www.basictalk.com/ is the site where you can sign up today, forVonage for $9.99, "every month". It was Vonage.com/basictalk for a while,but it is not there any more.

What I find annoying is products that pitch a low entry price withouttelling you what it is going to be in 3 months, or one year, or whatever,and then, _after_ you quite, try to get you to come back at the old price.

I use the Vonage adapter at home, and Vonage Extensions to make WiFi callson my cell phone.

Post by SMSThe reason for this change is probably because users of these devicesare not seeing any advertising when using Google Voice.

I believe Google does collect advertising metrics from voice and text. There have been a few occasions when I've discussed a product with someone on the phone and then I was fed Google ad banners for the same products on various web sites immediately after the call. Seemed to be more than just a coincidence.

Would google voice still work on my android phone? One solution I am considering is to use a cheap android phone as a home phone with google voice.

Milind

Post by SMSGoogle is dropping support for Extensible Messaging and PresenceProtocol (XMPP) in Google Voice on May 15, 2014.If you are using Google Voice with an ATA (analog telephone adapter),such as one of the Obihai or Grandstream VOIP devices (or a hackedMagicJack Plus), this combination will no longer work after May 15,2014. Google Voice is very popular with these devices since togetherthey enable local phone service completely free of any monthly charges(but no E911).The reason for this change is probably because users of these devicesare not seeing any advertising when using Google Voice.There are no no-cost alternatives, though Localphone and Callcentric arepretty low cost alternatives, especially if you're not making thousandsof minutes of local calls per month. Ooma is a good alternative as well,but it costs a bit more and you must use their VOIP adapter.<http://blog.obihai.com/2013/10/important-message-about-google-voice.html>

Post by m***@gmail.comWould google voice still work on my android phone? One solution I amconsidering is to use a cheap android phone as a home phone with googlevoice.

As nearly as I can tell, the tools that allowed WiFi usage of Google Voiceon your phone are gone, or soon will be.

With the standard Google Voice app, when you place a call, Google callsyou, and you answer your cell phone. For international, that can be a costsavings, but it is a cellular call to your phone, and cellular minutesduring the call.

In the US, you might be able to use the Vonage Mobile app to make WiFicalls, if that is what you are after. I use that from both my cell phoneand my WiFi-only tablet.

This is a dumb thing to do because it seems they forgot about the revenue they make from international calls. The best example is myself: while it is true that I was using a Google Voice number for free on an Obi device, I was making $10-$20 worth of international calls each month using Google Voice. Now I will be spending that money on international calls made through my new VoIP provider, which has comparable and sometimes cheaper rates. I will not be making international calls with Google Voice through the PC because it is inconvenient.

I'm glad the browser calling option still works (for now) since that's what I use the most. I can still send SMS though hangouts on Android, so that is good enough. I currently pay $10 a month for LTE data on my Nexus 5 (no voice plan) and have more than enough data to spare. I refuse to pay for a voice plan on this phone.

Now that GV Jack and Talkatone no longer work, it seems silly that I can't just use hangouts to make calls on Android like I do on my desktop or laptop. It's time for Google to modify their basic phone app, or google voice, or hangouts, so that calling through google voice on Android is as simple as it is through my browser.

Post by d***@gmail.comI'm glad the browser calling option still works (for now) since that's what I use the most. I can still send SMS though hangouts on Android, so that is good enough. I currently pay $10 a month for LTE data on my Nexus 5 (no voice plan) and have more than enough data to spare. I refuse to pay for a voice plan on this phone.Now that GV Jack and Talkatone no longer work, it seems silly that I can't just use hangouts to make calls on Android like I do on my desktop or laptop. It's time for Google to modify their basic phone app, or google voice, or hangouts, so that calling through google voice on Android is as simple as it is through my browser.

I'm so glad my job interview with Talkatone didn't go well. I thought itwould be an interesting place to work (Java + iOS), but their needsdidn't line up with my particular skills. It's a cool app, but withoutGV, I don't know where they can stand out and monetize. Basic text/voiceover IP apps on iOS are a dime a dozen.

Post by SMSGoogle is dropping support for Extensible Messaging and PresenceProtocol (XMPP) in Google Voice on May 15, 2014.If you are using Google Voice with an ATA (analog telephone adapter),such as one of the Obihai or Grandstream VOIP devices (or a hackedMagicJack Plus), this combination will no longer work after May 15,2014. Google Voice is very popular with these devices since togetherthey enable local phone service completely free of any monthly charges(but no E911).The reason for this change is probably because users of these devicesare not seeing any advertising when using Google Voice.There are no no-cost alternatives, though Localphone and Callcentric arepretty low cost alternatives, especially if you're not making thousandsof minutes of local calls per month. Ooma is a good alternative as well,but it costs a bit more and you must use their VOIP adapter.<http://blog.obihai.com/2013/10/important-message-about-google-voice.html>

My Obi unit is still letting me make calls via my analog phone and today is May 16. Anyone hear of any announcement of the fact that it was delayed or just not going to happen right away. Maybe when they say "not going to support XMPP protocol" might mean they are not going to keep it updated to work with Google Voice. Maybe it will work unless they happen to hit a button to change it in some way.

Post by d***@gmail.comMy Obi unit is still letting me make calls via my analog phone and today is May 16. Anyone hear of any announcement of the fact that it was delayed or just not going to happen right away. Maybe when they say "not going to support XMPP protocol" might mean they are not going to keep it updated to work with Google Voice. Maybe it will work unless they happen to hit a button to change it in some way.

Yep mine is still working... I had researched alternatives but never made the switch. I'll probably just wait until it's disconnected.

Post by SMSGoogle is dropping support for Extensible Messaging and PresenceProtocol (XMPP) in Google Voice on May 15, 2014.

I, like many in my situation, rely on the free VoIP service with my Google Voice number. I can't pay for a home phone, nor can I afford cell phone service. I do not want to change my Google Voice chat feature and home phone voice service to another provider. I can't afford to. This totally sucks! Was anyone thinking of the negative impact it would have on people on fixed incomes who rely on this service? I am totally upset and very much hurt financially and physically by this change!

Post by SMSGoogle is dropping support for Extensible Messaging and PresenceProtocol (XMPP) in Google Voice on May 15, 2014.

I, like many in my situation, rely on the free VoIP service withmy Google Voice number. I can't pay for a home phone, nor can Iafford cell phone service. I do not want to change my Google Voicechat feature and home phone voice service to another provider. Ican't afford to. This totally sucks! Was anyone thinking of thenegative impact it would have on people on fixed incomes who relyon this service? I am totally upset and very much hurt financiallyand physically by this change!

I sympathize with your plight. I was down to $13 in my checkingaccount this morning and had to call my financial advisor to movesome funds into the account to cover food purchases later today,DMV car registration, and a pizza since my Social Security depositsare the 3rd Wednesday of every month (bastards wouldn't change it)which is next Wednesday, 21 May 2014. I literally budget down tothe penny and I know the current prices of everything I [will] buy.

From events and things I've heard and seen over the years, whenevera Google project manager gets bored, the project goes belly-up andthat's my take on the Google Voice issue.

TANSTAAFL -- There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch

As we've discussed here before, Ooma VoIP service is essentiallyfree except for a $3.91 monthly fee for federal/state taxes andE911 service. The purchase of the Ooma Telo box (probably can befound refurbed/used) is necessary as is a relatively hi-speedInternet connection -- DSL will work, cable is better -- as canbe tested here:

http://www.ooma.com/support/internet-speed-test

and they'll tell you if your connection will work satisfactorily.

What company *IS* your present home telephone service provider?

How would you be able to change to another one if you wanted todo so?

You're using gmail and Usenet which implies you have an Internetconnection, so what's wrong with the idea of cancelling yourpresent home telephone service and going VoIP over, say, Ooma?[Or are you using DSL over your present phone service?]

Post by Thad Floryan...I sympathize with your plight. I was down to $13 in my checkingaccount this morning and had to call my financial advisor to movesome funds into the account to cover food purchases later today,DMV car registration, and a pizza since my Social Security depositsare the 3rd Wednesday of every month (bastards wouldn't change it)which is next Wednesday, 21 May 2014. I literally budget down tothe penny and I know the current prices of everything I [will] buy....

Just as a odd factoid, the payment date for regular social security isdetermined by your birthday unless you started receiving benefits priorto May 1997

[...]... since my Social Security depositsare the 3rd Wednesday of every month (bastards wouldn't change it)which is next Wednesday, 21 May 2014....

Just as a odd factoid, the payment date for regular social security isdetermined by your birthday unless you started receiving benefits priorto May 1997Benefits paid on Birth date onSecond Wednesday 1st to 10thThird Wednesday 11th to 20thFourth Wednesday 21st to 31stSeehttp://www.ssa.gov/pubs/EN-05-10031.pdf

Hi Roy,

That is "odd" in that they never told me why they couldn't change thepayment date which frequently falls past the due dates of many bills.

I've since been accommodated by most businesses except PG&E who keepsmoving the due date closer to the beginning of each month -- paymentsoften cross PG&E bills in the mail but it hasn't been a problem yetespecially since I'm on PG&E's "CARE" program (and Cal Water's LIRA).

Post by RoyAlsoIf you apply for Social Security or Supplemental Security Incomebenefits, a new law went into effect March 1, 2013, requiring that youreceive your payments electronically.

Which makes sense since there's no chance of checks being stolen fromone's mail box. Plus, the deposits (at least for me) appear by 1:30amon the payment date seen via online banking -- I always check to be surethe money is in the account before I drive to the post office and mailmy monthly bill payments for accounts that vary monthly whereas Comcast,Ooma and Verio are the same amount each month and are auto-paid.

[...]... since my Social Security depositsare the 3rd Wednesday of every month (bastards wouldn't change it)which is next Wednesday, 21 May 2014....

Just as a odd factoid, the payment date for regular social security isdetermined by your birthday unless you started receiving benefits priorto May 1997Benefits paid on Birth date onSecond Wednesday 1st to 10thThird Wednesday 11th to 20thFourth Wednesday 21st to 31stSeehttp://www.ssa.gov/pubs/EN-05-10031.pdf

Hi Roy,That is "odd" in that they never told me why they couldn't change thepayment date which frequently falls past the due dates of many bills.I've since been accommodated by most businesses except PG&E who keepsmoving the due date closer to the beginning of each month -- paymentsoften cross PG&E bills in the mail but it hasn't been a problem yetespecially since I'm on PG&E's "CARE" program (and Cal Water's LIRA)....

PGE runs on their own billing time. Check your bill and it will showthe number of days in the billing period. It varies from 28 to 32 days.In the "old" days of meter readers, the cycle moved around toaccommodate weekends and holidays when the readers didn't work

With "smart" meters, I don't know why they cling to their billing cycles.

[...]... since my Social Security depositsare the 3rd Wednesday of every month (bastards wouldn't change it)which is next Wednesday, 21 May 2014....

Just as a odd factoid, the payment date for regular social security isdetermined by your birthday unless you started receiving benefits priorto May 1997Benefits paid on Birth date onSecond Wednesday 1st to 10thThird Wednesday 11th to 20thFourth Wednesday 21st to 31stSeehttp://www.ssa.gov/pubs/EN-05-10031.pdf

Hi Roy,That is "odd" in that they never told me why they couldn't change thepayment date which frequently falls past the due dates of many bills.I've since been accommodated by most businesses except PG&E who keepsmoving the due date closer to the beginning of each month -- paymentsoften cross PG&E bills in the mail but it hasn't been a problem yetespecially since I'm on PG&E's "CARE" program (and Cal Water's LIRA)....

PGE runs on their own billing time. Check your bill and it will showthe number of days in the billing period. It varies from 28 to 32 days.In the "old" days of meter readers, the cycle moved around toaccommodate weekends and holidays when the readers didn't workWith "smart" meters, I don't know why they cling to their billing cycles.

Hi Roy,

Another thing PG&E doesn't tell people is the Smart and TOU meters lastonly 10 years or so before they go belly-up due to internal battery death.

Back about 35-40 years ago I was one of the 100 households who volunteeredand was accepted for the Time-Of-Use (TOU) meter test program which allegedlywould save me money by charging a high rate for electrical usage between12 noon and 6PM Monday-Friday, and a much lower rate at all other timesand on weekends. The program was a resounding success and I save a LOT ofmoney.

Fast forward 10 years and one month's bill more than tripled due to the TOUmeter's internal battery having died and the internal clock W-A-Y off so thatmy laundry (electric dryer), cooking and computer usage which I was doing at7pm to 1am was being charged as if it was 12noon to 6pm. YIKES!

PG&E and I resolved that amicably (esp. since I'm a shareholder) and every10 years since then PG&E has installed a new meter. My "Smart Meter" wasinstalled 11 January 2012 and I expect it to belly-up during 2022 andrequire replacement -- I wonder if PG&E has forgotten about the batteryfailures in such meters and will have to replace them all. :-)

I'm on the 5th meter since I moved here in 1966. Original meter was ananalog one, then 3 TOU digital meters, and now a "Smart Meter".

My present PG&E bill is $55.16 with a 14 May 2014 due date that I cannotpay until 21 May 2014 when Social Security deposits money to my checkingaccount. My PG&E bills used to be due around the 25th of each month.

As a result of the original TOU failure, every night since then I record thepresent meter's readings so I can catch when a battery fails. The differentforms I use to record TOU and "Smart Meter" (SM) readings are here:

http://thadlabs.com/FILES/PG+E_elec_meter_reads_TOU.pdf 24.2kB

http://thadlabs.com/FILES/PG+E_elec_meter_reads_SM.pdf 10.5kB

and here's a similar form I use to track water usage to detect leaks:

http://thadlabs.com/FILES/Cal_Water_meter_reads.pdf 6.48kB

Feel welcome to use those forms. For the curious, I use xfig to producethe forms http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xfig which runs on UNIX/Linux.

[...]... since my Social Security depositsare the 3rd Wednesday of every month (bastards wouldn't change it)which is next Wednesday, 21 May 2014....

Just as a odd factoid, the payment date for regular social security isdetermined by your birthday unless you started receiving benefits priorto May 1997Benefits paid on Birth date onSecond Wednesday 1st to 10thThird Wednesday 11th to 20thFourth Wednesday 21st to 31stSeehttp://www.ssa.gov/pubs/EN-05-10031.pdf

Hi Roy,That is "odd" in that they never told me why they couldn't change thepayment date which frequently falls past the due dates of many bills.I've since been accommodated by most businesses except PG&E who keepsmoving the due date closer to the beginning of each month -- paymentsoften cross PG&E bills in the mail but it hasn't been a problem yetespecially since I'm on PG&E's "CARE" program (and Cal Water's LIRA)....

PGE runs on their own billing time. Check your bill and it will showthe number of days in the billing period. It varies from 28 to 32 days.In the "old" days of meter readers, the cycle moved around toaccommodate weekends and holidays when the readers didn't workWith "smart" meters, I don't know why they cling to their billing cycles.

Hi Roy,Another thing PG&E doesn't tell people is the Smart and TOU meters lastonly 10 years or so before they go belly-up due to internal battery death.

Post by Roy[...]Just as a odd factoid, the payment date for regular social security isdetermined by your birthday unless you started receiving benefits priorto May 1997Benefits paid on Birth date onSecond Wednesday 1st to 10thThird Wednesday 11th to 20thFourth Wednesday 21st to 31stSeehttp://www.ssa.gov/pubs/EN-05-10031.pdf[..]

Hi Roy,

And here's a document from the Congressional Reference Service whichdescribes how Social Security benefits are computed noting FAS is theFederation of American Scientists' website I've mentioned previously:

"How Social Security Benefits Are Computed: In Brief," May 12, 2014,10 pages, 264kB:

http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R43542.pdf

For those who've forgotten:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federation_of_American_Scientists

who provides for free all documentation the US Government doesn't wantits tax-paying citizens to see or know about including military docs,Department of State docs, Executive Orders, and much more.

Post by SMSGoogle is dropping support for Extensible Messaging and PresenceProtocol (XMPP) in Google Voice on May 15, 2014.If you are using Google Voice with an ATA (analog telephone adapter),such as one of the Obihai or Grandstream VOIP devices (or a hackedMagicJack Plus), this combination will no longer work after May 15,2014. Google Voice is very popular with these devices since togetherthey enable local phone service completely free of any monthly charges(but no E911).The reason for this change is probably because users of these devicesare not seeing any advertising when using Google Voice.There are no no-cost alternatives, though Localphone and Callcentric arepretty low cost alternatives, especially if you're not making thousandsof minutes of local calls per month. Ooma is a good alternative as well,but it costs a bit more and you must use their VOIP adapter.<http://blog.obihai.com/2013/10/important-message-about-google-voice.html>

I have yet to see Google make this announcement. Obihai said that it will stop working, and then offered to sell me phone service.

Post by SMSGoogle is dropping support for Extensible Messaging and PresenceProtocol (XMPP) in Google Voice on May 15, 2014.If you are using Google Voice with an ATA (analog telephone adapter),such as one of the Obihai or Grandstream VOIP devices (or a hackedMagicJack Plus), this combination will no longer work after May 15,2014. Google Voice is very popular with these devices since togetherthey enable local phone service completely free of any monthly charges(but no E911).The reason for this change is probably because users of these devicesare not seeing any advertising when using Google Voice.There are no no-cost alternatives, though Localphone and Callcentric arepretty low cost alternatives, especially if you're not making thousandsof minutes of local calls per month. Ooma is a good alternative as well,but it costs a bit more and you must use their VOIP adapter.<http://blog.obihai.com/2013/10/important-message-about-google-voice.html>

I have yet to see Google make this announcement. Obihai said that it will stop working, and then offered to sell me phone service.Google, on the other hand remains silent.Thoughts?

They are under no obligation to make such an announcement. They neverpromoted Google Voice as working with these services. Talkatone also nolonger works either.

Post by SMSGoogle is dropping support for Extensible Messaging and PresenceProtocol (XMPP) in Google Voice on May 15, 2014.If you are using Google Voice with an ATA (analog telephone adapter),such as one of the Obihai or Grandstream VOIP devices (or a hackedMagicJack Plus), this combination will no longer work after May 15,2014. Google Voice is very popular with these devices since togetherthey enable local phone service completely free of any monthly charges(but no E911).The reason for this change is probably because users of these devicesare not seeing any advertising when using Google Voice.There are no no-cost alternatives, though Localphone and Callcentric arepretty low cost alternatives, especially if you're not making thousandsof minutes of local calls per month. Ooma is a good alternative as well,but it costs a bit more and you must use their VOIP adapter.<http://blog.obihai.com/2013/10/important-message-about-google-voice.html>

I have yet to see Google make this announcement. Obihai said that itwill stop working, and then offered to sell me phone service.Google, on the other hand remains silent.Thoughts?

They are under no obligation to make such an announcement. They neverpromoted Google Voice as working with these services. Talkatone also nolonger works either.

Post by SMSGoogle is dropping support for Extensible Messaging and PresenceProtocol (XMPP) in Google Voice on May 15, 2014.If you are using Google Voice with an ATA (analog telephone adapter),such as one of the Obihai or Grandstream VOIP devices (or a hackedMagicJack Plus), this combination will no longer work after May 15,2014. Google Voice is very popular with these devices since togetherthey enable local phone service completely free of any monthly charges(but no E911).The reason for this change is probably because users of these devicesare not seeing any advertising when using Google Voice.There are no no-cost alternatives, though Localphone and Callcentric arepretty low cost alternatives, especially if you're not making thousandsof minutes of local calls per month. Ooma is a good alternative as well,but it costs a bit more and you must use their VOIP adapter.<http://blog.obihai.com/2013/10/important-message-about-google-voice.html>

I'd would like to see them to come out own VOIP adapter and just be a cheaper service then the others if they would beat the other VOIP services I'd get it. Also google would still a big profits. I'd use because the features that let's me have way better control then the other companies that either don't have those features or they get to costly. I also think that since the google fiber service growth that a lot of services well be gone from free. but from what I'm hearing is the best service out and a lot of other companies are worried.

Post by SMSGoogle is dropping support for Extensible Messaging and PresenceProtocol (XMPP) in Google Voice on May 15, 2014.If you are using Google Voice with an ATA (analog telephone adapter),such as one of the Obihai or Grandstream VOIP devices (or a hackedMagicJack Plus), this combination will no longer work after May 15,2014. Google Voice is very popular with these devices since togetherthey enable local phone service completely free of any monthly charges(but no E911).The reason for this change is probably because users of these devicesare not seeing any advertising when using Google Voice.There are no no-cost alternatives, though Localphone and Callcentric arepretty low cost alternatives, especially if you're not making thousandsof minutes of local calls per month. Ooma is a good alternative as well,but it costs a bit more and you must use their VOIP adapter.<http://blog.obihai.com/2013/10/important-message-about-google-voice.html>

Ooma has been great to me. I've had it since 2009 and grandfathered in on the completely FREE service, no fees, taxes etc for the last 5 years. Works fine, sounds fine. Although today the internet connection went out and I touched Ooma box on it was HOT! really hot. I reset it and it still works though.Easy to set up. I'd get another one. Although it's $10/mo if you want call Blocking. Id like that and I see that $35/yr Vestalink service plus a $70 OBi202 VoIP Phone Adapter would get me E911 and call blocking. So $3/mo, which is reasonable and I don't do many calls. Many I can do on Google Voice.

Post by SMSGoogle is dropping support for Extensible Messaging and PresenceProtocol (XMPP) in Google Voice on May 15, 2014.If you are using Google Voice with an ATA (analog telephone adapter),such as one of the Obihai or Grandstream VOIP devices (or a hackedMagicJack Plus), this combination will no longer work after May 15,2014. Google Voice is very popular with these devices since togetherthey enable local phone service completely free of any monthly charges(but no E911).The reason for this change is probably because users of these devicesare not seeing any advertising when using Google Voice.There are no no-cost alternatives, though Localphone and Callcentric arepretty low cost alternatives, especially if you're not making thousandsof minutes of local calls per month. Ooma is a good alternative as well,but it costs a bit more and you must use their VOIP adapter.<http://blog.obihai.com/2013/10/important-message-about-google-voice.html>

Is this working for anyone else?My OBI device has seemed to stop working? How about you guys?

Post by SMS[...]<http://blog.obihai.com/2013/10/important-message-about-google-voice.html>

Is this working for anyone else?My OBI device has seemed to stop working? How about you guys?This is on June 3rd 2014

Did you not read what's at the above URL?It clearly states the Google service was to end on 15 May 2014,3 weeks ago. Look back 3-4 weeks in this group's messages forthe thread discussing this issue.Your OBIhai device is likely still fine; it's an ATA device andyou'll probably need to find another VoIP provider if you wishto continue using it. FYI: 'ATA'='Analog Telephone Adapter'.I opted for Ooma earlier this uear and I am very pleased withtheir services.Thad